need help loading win98

I've got an old Compaq 5062 computer that had XP installed on it. I need to
go back to 98. The problem is, I cannot get the computer to boot from the
floppy. There's a problem somewhere, and I can't figure it out. Even in
Windows the floppy won't work correctly. Any disk that's inserted comes up
with "The disk is not formatted. Would you like to format now?" I know the
floppies are good. I have changed floppy drives and cables. The drive is
recognized in bios, and it appears to be looking at the floppy drive first
during boot up, but it won't read it. It bypasses it right to the hard
drive and loads Windows.

What might I be missing, and if the floppy bus is bad, what are my options
for getting 98 on this machine?

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Go in to the BIOS setup of the computer, and make sure that the floppy
drive is allowed to be the first startup device. Save your changes
before exiting the BIOS mode.

If the computer will still not start up with the floppy drive, then
change the drive. If it still does not start with the new floppy drive,
then try the cable. Other than that, it would be the controler.

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JM wrote:
> I've got an old Compaq 5062 computer that had XP installed on it. I need to
> go back to 98. The problem is, I cannot get the computer to boot from the
> floppy. There's a problem somewhere, and I can't figure it out. Even in
> Windows the floppy won't work correctly. Any disk that's inserted comes up
> with "The disk is not formatted. Would you like to format now?" I know the
> floppies are good. I have changed floppy drives and cables. The drive is
> recognized in bios, and it appears to be looking at the floppy drive first
> during boot up, but it won't read it. It bypasses it right to the hard
> drive and loads Windows.
>
> What might I be missing, and if the floppy bus is bad, what are my options
> for getting 98 on this machine?
>
> Thank you,
>
> jm
>
>
You stated you tried different floppies *and* drives, so that means
they are not the problem.
Try the following: unplug all daughter boards except the video, and
disconnect all IDE devices from the MB and see if it can boot from a
known good floppy and drive.
Set the BIOS for boot order: FD, CD, IDEzero.
Be advised that if the FD is not connected correctly (ie cable
"flipped"), the light will stay on forever and it will not operate
properly; this is safe for the MB and the FD - just flip the cable for
correct "polarity" and try again.
Now you can reinsert the daughter boards one at a time and check each
time for proper FD operation.
Then, do the same with the IDE devices Primary master, then Primary
Slave, then Secondary Master and lastly the Secondary Slave.
Usually the problem stems from a bad or incorrect connection.

Just curious. Have you tried setting up Win98 by booting to CD. Unless
your copy is really old it should be bootable.

First things first. Boot to XP desktop. Right mouse click on your C:
drive. Go to properties. Check the file system. If it's Fat32 then you
are good to go. Just setup BIOS to boot from CD first. When prompted
press any key boot fom cd. Select Win98 setup with CD Rom support.
continue from there.

If it's NTFS then you will have to do this differently. I am assuming
you have an XP CD. Boot from it. Delete any partions on the start up
drive. Re-ceate a partition and format it with Fat32 quick format. When
it's finished formatting reboot the machine and boot from the Win98 CD.
Follow the instructions above for installing Win98.

This won't fix the floppy drive issue, but at least you can get Win98
on the machine and then trouble shoot the floppy problem from there.

<I've got an old Compaq 5062 computer that had XP installed on it. I
need to
<go back to 98. The problem is, I cannot get the computer to boot
from the
<floppy. There's a problem somewhere, and I can't figure it out. Even
in
<Windows the floppy won't work correctly. Any disk that's inserted
comes up
<with "The disk is not formatted. Would you like to format now?" I
know the
<floppies are good. I have changed floppy drives and cables. The
drive is
<recognized in bios, and it appears to be looking at the floppy drive
first
<during boot up, but it won't read it. It bypasses it right to the
hard
<drive and loads Windows.
<
<What might I be missing, and if the floppy bus is bad, what are my
options
<for getting 98 on this machine?
<
<Thank you,

One option that has not been touched on is making a Win98 bootable CD
start disk. If you have a machine with a working floppy and a cd
burner, it is simple. I use Nero so these instructions are for that
particular program. If you use something else, you can probably work
it out the same way.
Go to http://www.bootdisk.com/ and download the bootdisk for your
version of 98, make sure it has cdrom support. Unpack it and write it
to a floppy. Open Nero, select create bootable CD, follow the prompts
and it will eventually look for the floppy to copy the image from. Let
it all complete and then boot from the cd you just made. It works.

If you want to make your 98 cd bootable:
In Nero, there is a point before it looks for the floppy image where
you can add files to your compilation, if you like, you can copy the
win98 folder from your original cd and add it to the compilation. End
result is a bootable 98 cd.
No retail version of win98 was bootable, you have to make your own.
Only some of the OEM versions were bootable.
__

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